Message from the CEO
Akiş REIT was ranked as one of the world’s top 500 companies in the field of sustainable growth in the list compiled by Time & Statista in 2024, and was one of the three companies from Türkiye to enter the list.
The commercial real estate and retail sector, where we operate, maintained its dynamism and upward momentum in 2024. This strong trend helped us break new turnover records in our shopping centres with the growth in our rental income exceeding the rate of inflation. One of our primary goals for 2025 is to maximize the rental income we obtain from our operational real estate and to undertake new investments. In addition, we aim to take our competence in creating preferred living spaces one step further by focusing our digitalization and innovation focused work on stakeholder satisfaction and expectations. At the same time, sustainability will remain an integral part of our corporate culture and the fundamental driving force of all our operations.
The year 2024 brought considerable successes, as we both exceeded the previous year’s performance and our own expectations, further strengthening our positive predictions for the future. In this period, occupancy management, leasing strategies, savings measures, digitalization and innovation-oriented efforts were the key elements of our strong performance in achieving the highest efficiency from our operational real estate.
During the year, we pressed on with our efforts to stand apart from our competitors by drawing on our visionary perspective and global trends in our shopping centers, which operated at high occupancy rates. Although visitor numbers have not yet returned to their pre-pandemic levels, the steady growth in shopping volume throughout the year and the breaking of new records for turnover in our stores can be deemed a significant success. In this process, we continued to distinguish our shopping centers from their competitors with our updated store mixes.
At the end of 2024, our company signed a revenue sharing based contract to develop a mixed project with a focus on housing on an area of approximately 100,000 square metres in the Sahrayıcedit area of Istanbul’s Kadıköy district. Construction work on the project is planned to get underway in 2025 after the completion of the zoning applications and the award of the license.
In addition to these developments, we continued our work by adopting the culture of success and institutionalism prioritized by Akkök Holding. As we published our fifth Sustainability Report in 2024, we became the leader in the global ranking in our sector as one of the highest scoring companies in the Borsa Istanbul Sustainability Index. We also succeeded in increasing our Corporate Governance Rating from 96.37 to 96.46, maintaining our title as the company with the highest rating among real estate investment trusts and construction companies.
In 2025, Akiş REIT will continue to add value to the country’s economy, rapidly adapt to the changes in consumer behavior and the dynamics of the new era and resolutely maintain our leading position in the sector. I would like to take this opportunity to express my sincere gratitude to all my colleagues who have contributed immensely to our success, our valuable business partners who have always stood with us, our shareholders who have placed their trust in us and all of our stakeholders.
Respectfully,
Levent Çanakçılı
Member of the Board of Directors and General Manager